Little Brother Documentary: A Conversation That Will Save a Generation

Little Brother is a 10-year/10-chapterseries of short documentary films that give Black boys as young as nine years old the unique opportunity to have their voices heard on a topic society tends to rob them of: Love.

Little Brother. A conversation that will save a generation.

Filmmaker Nicole Franklin states: “As of this date, I have spent 14 years filming African American subjects. I have been known to film primarily women, but never too far from their side is the magnetic, passionate, estranged, complicated, tortured and, at other times, joyous relationship with men.

In 2009, I was in my tenth year of independent filmmaking, and I could not ignore exploring the men in our culture any more. This was prompted by questions from my audiences: What kind of men do the women you film share their lives with? Are their husbands, boyfriends or lovers emasculated in any way by their success? Do they feel they are fully supported at home in order to pursue their passion? Of course I had answers to these questions–from the women’s point of view. But what would their men, or any men in this case, have to say about their affection in return for these very special women? Dare I say it? What was not being discussed at length in my films nor any others at the time was the fully realized ability of African American men to love.